Boomerang Nebula's page

A few thoughts.

It might not seem like it, but the GM is “playing” the game as well, it’s not just the players. So the players should make an effort to engage in the game world in a way that is fun for the GM too. It should not be up to the GM to solve every problem at the table.

It sounds like the player who wrote the opening post is interested in helping fix the problem, which is a great start.

If I was a player at that table I would:

1) Encourage the GM to boost boss encounters so that they remain significant.

2) Tell the GM to change the occasional encounter to invalidate normal tactics.

3) Otherwise, leave the other encounters as written, if the PCs come up with clever tactics let them work most of the time.

it's always interesting to see what others think and the different experiences.

I really think different groups have different goals in what they want to have fun doing on the whole. Of course people vary individually in their style and approach. I've always felt people that really only played D&D variants are kinda stuck in that experience and model and don't experience detailed, stylistic, storytelling, or down right silly games.

I’ve played so many different RPGs I’ve lost count, and I’ve always returned to D&D/Pathfinder.

In my opinion some games are better in particular areas: VTM has better atmosphere, GURPS has better mechanics, Pendragon better facilitates roleplaying, and FATE better supports narrative. However, as a total package, nothing beats the original format, and Pathfinder 1st edition executes that format the best. Even better than AD&D which I consider second best.

I’m sure at least part of that is based on nostalgia, but I can’t help feeling that the old trope of cleric, fighter, mage, and thief working together to conquer a dungeon can’t be beat.

Quoting myself from a different thread

Some of the reasons I love Pathfinder.

1. Accessibility: there is always a regular game going in my local area and the local game shops stock a fair range of books.
2. The PRD/SRD: if I don't have my books with me I can look up the rules on my phone.
3. The OGL: which means there is heaps of cool 3P content to draw from.
4. Nostalgia with options: back in the 80s my friends and I started with D&D. Pathfinder lets me relive the old days but with many more options to choose from.
5. The APs: the adventure paths are really well written and fun to play.
6. Golarion: very diverse and interesting world, plenty of story and adventure hooks for me to make use of.
7. Support: the game is well supported by Paizo and the fans. If I have any questions I can go on to the forum and search for a thread that answers my question.
8. The look: the artwork throughout the books, especially the maps, looks amazing.

I posted that years ago, before 2nd edition Pathfinder came out, but it is still true, at least for me.

Assuming you want shaping effects to be common I would first work out which spell on the wizard spell list is closest to the effect you want then apply the formula:

DC = 15 + 3 x spell level.

I would rule that a 10 minute ritual is required to use a shaping effect unless the PC spends a mythic point to reduce the time to a standard action. I would let characters spend an additional mythic point to use mythic surge on the charisma check too. I would also let some types of luck bonuses apply to the charisma check, even if the rules wouldn’t ordinarily allow it.

The Dimension of Time is so mysterious that you could hand wave the canonical jungle description as the perspective of a single traveler following their own timeline.

I was thinking you should have an overarching theme for this campaign. The first thing that came to mind is the duality of existence where many aspects of reality have two parts: light and dark, good and evil, chaos and order, life and death, male and female etc.

How this applies to Aroden is that when he ventured into the Dark Tapestry in the hope of uncovering the nature of reality he discovered things, terrible dangerous things, forbidden knowledge that was kept locked away for good reason. This knowledge was so powerful and profound it didn’t just drive Aroden to the edge of insanity it literally ripped him into two entirely different opposing beings. This is the real reason he can’t be contacted and is believed to be dead, he now exists as two new gods, one lawful good, the other lawful evil (and possibly one male and one female if you like).

Your Oracle PC unknowingly worships one half of the split god, but Aroden needs to be made whole again. That is the quest the Oracle embarked upon when he disappeared and that is the quest the new PCs will ultimately find themselves on. They must journey to the Dark Tapestry and fulfil the prophecy.

“That is not dead which can eternal lie,
And with strange aeons even death may die.
And that which died shall forever be undone,
Unless the discordant two reconcile to one.”

My first reaction is this sounds like a legendary campaign, truly epic in scope.

Since you are planning so far in advance you have the opportunity to drop hints about Aroden’s fate right from the start for some awesome foreshadowing. So my advice is be very clear about Aroden’s backstory and record it in great detail so that you can drop hints on the fly if the PC’s investigations don’t proceed as anticipated. Don’t worry about giving away the big reveal early on, my experience is that even if the PCs guess correctly they will never be sure and in a campaign that long they will end up second guessing themselves many times.

Crazy idea: could you adapt the Swarm rules to create a Swarm of Shoggoths? That sounds mindless and apocalyptic to me.

In my experience high level campaigns work the best in the hostile Outer Planes. That way it doesn’t seem weird to be constantly fighting overpowered foes and the environment itself can be used to challenge them. Plus the PCs can become unwitting pawns in cosmic power struggles of epic proportions.

Here’s an idea:

The PCs are invited to the King’s banquet to celebrate the success of their adventures. Mid-way through the banquet a horde of devils arrives led by a ridiculously powerful mythic archduke of Hell, the personal emissary of Asmodeus himself. The PCs are completely outmatched. The devils slaughter everyone including the PCs and take their stuff before leaving. After the battle the King and one PC is revived (preferably one who can revive the others) by the royal healer with a Raise Dead spell. They awake to find the royal banquet hall desecrated and covered in Infernal writing mocking the fallen heroes. Feel free to insert whatever insults will rile the PCs the most. The idea is to make them want revenge so desperately they will travel to Hell to get it. Thus the campaign begins.

One big plus of homebrew campaigns is flexibility. If you find something isn’t working as well as you hoped you can change it. If it is a major change make sure you get buy in from your players before you make the change.

Another is the world building. The process of creating a campaign world is ideally nearly as much fun as actually running the game. In a sandbox style homebrew campaign this is especially important because a huge amount of content you create might never be used.

In my opinion there are two features you absolutely must have for a homebrew campaign to be successful.

1) the idea must be interesting to you (the GM). The last thing you want to do is get bored of running your own campaign and watch it turn from fun to a tedious chore. If you are not sure how long you can sustain your interest plan for a short campaign and then extend it later if it feels right. Running long campaigns can be surprisingly taxing, even if you have a really interesting idea, so take breaks and let other GMs run their game for a while if you can.

and

2) the idea must be interesting to your players. Before you do too much work pitch the idea to your players and ask for feedback. Be open to tweaking your idea based on the feedback you get. Do not drop a complete surprise on your players. If you want to have a cool twist, tell them there will be a twist and drop hints as to what that might be. Players who genuinely want to be surprised won’t try too hard to guess correctly. Those players who don’t like surprises so much, you know the ones, they plan out their entire build at the start of the campaign, well they should be able to guess at least some details. The idea is to, as much as possible, keep everyone happy.

I just checked: page 70 of Planar Adventures states that demigods have stat blocks and deities are “beyond the concept of rules”.

For me the simplest way to play evil characters (usually NPCs) is to take a hardline or twisted stance on something that would ordinarily be considered a virtue.

In the case of your character the obvious choice is fanatical patriotism based on your backstory. Another common one is a strong sense of justice that gets twisted into the character acting as judge jury and executioner, as the old saying goes. These are so common as to be cliches so you might want to pick a different virtue or combination of virtues to twist to make your character more original.

231. Are you sure you want to know? Well alright then.

230. Aroden travelled through the Dark Tapestry all the way to the centre of the universe, and, well, I’m not sure how to put this delicately. Azathoth has a lot of mouths to feed.

228. He made the mistake of saying: “If you strike me down I will become more powerful than you can possibly imagine.”

229. It turns out he is only mostly dead. You see he got caught up on a quest for true love with a giant and a Spaniard who is not left handed and…

@ Derklord

From the Pathfinder Wiki entry for Undead

“The state of undeath is considered a severe moral crime as it violates both a person's body and soul.”

The goddess of undeath (Urgathoa) is neutral evil. The stat blocks for undead in the Bestiary have undead as evil. If we are talking about Pathfinder undead and the process of creating them, they are clearly evil.

If you are talking about the real world, unless you are coming from a premise of moral relativism where terms like “good” and “evil” lose their meaning, then creating undead (assuming it was possible) is definitely an evil act that conflicts with our natural rights to life and liberty which are the most basic inherent individual rights any moral system depends on.

If undead aren’t a perversion of life, then what is?

Undead are a perversion of life. They are evil no matter how you try to rationalise it.

In addition to what Mysterious Stranger said the Pathfinder book Planar Adventures pages 64-69 has information on what happens to mortals when they die, judgement by Pharasma and how undead fit into the picture. That is a great resource if you are the GM.

If you are a player ask your GM.

I thought "core" meant Core Rulebook, but I recognise that the term can be ambiguous. I will be careful to say "Core Rulebook" or "CRB" in future to prevent confusion.

I think one thing that needs to be taken into account when assessing a conflict between Earth and Golarion is means of access. I'm assuming you have a portal that is linking the two worlds. Something for maybe a dozen people at a time to go through at most. Something that most military vehicles wouldn't fit through. No ships. No airplanes.

To me the battle is Earth starts invading Golarion (for completely unknowable reasons) and a high level adventuring team shows up and figures out how to get rid of the portal.

Winning isn't always about completely eliminating your enemy's supply of soldiers.

Edit: Well, it is but that doesn't mean killing them. Sometimes it means closing the magic portal allowing passage between your two worlds.

What high level adventuring team?

I don’t recall a high level adventuring team turning up to stop Baba Yaga from entering Golarian and establishing Irrisen.

The impression I get of Golarian is a world in decline. Once mighty empires like Azlant are long gone and any heroic adventurers that exist are tied up dealing with local crises.

I also don’t see why it would take a long time to learn magic. The sorcerer class has the equal youngest possible starting age (16 years). Magic is innate, you can literally perform magic with zero training.

Boomerang Nebula, do you really think the author deliberately wrote the ability to benefit highly specific class combinations in a way that no other ability in the game does, all without pointing out this oddity in any way?

2+2 should never equal 5, unless your game is set in 1984.

I don’t have a strong opinion on the author’s intent. On the one hand the Arcane Trickster already existed which has sneak attack progression one level behind the Rogue, and the Master Spy existed and has even slower sneak attack progression. I find it hard to believe that the author (a game designer) was not aware of these classes. So their intent was probably to give sneak attack a small boost. When new classes came with even slower sneak attack progression nobody thought to issue an errata, so I tend to think the designers are okay with how the Vivisectionist interacts with other classes. It clearly is not game breaking.

On the other hand the author hasn’t clarified their position so my opinion is still speculation and I’m happy to change my mind if more information is forthcoming, or someone can make a strong case otherwise.

What I do have a strong opinion on and really object to is being accused of “trolling” or “lying” for simply disagreeing on an interpretation. That is out of line.

@ zza ni,

Of course I would allow it! A 20th level character should be really powerful, bordering on demigod status. I shouldn’t be quibbling with my players over a few sneak attack dice, I should be concentrating on making the game fun for everyone. Why would I worry about the Vivisectionist when the party wizard will be the one trying to pull most of the game breaking shenanigans? Why would I be so petty over something so inconsequential?

I really can’t fathom the hostility over this. It boggles my mind.

Nobody is entirely sure what happened, all they definitely remember is that it all went pear shaped when they challenged an Arch Duke of Hell to a game of truth or dare.

@ DungeonmasterCal

All the best mate, I hope everything works out for you.

My favourite are the mid-levels 5-10. But really I enjoy levels 1-15 a lot. I struggle with high levels 16+. The game is really getting ridiculous by this stage. Most challenges are easily bypassed, the difference between optimised and non-optimised characters becomes so profound as to be problematic, and even short combats seem to take forever. Also, by the time I get to high level I’m usually bored of my character concept. I would rather ditch the high levels than level 1.

At level 1 you can easily have interesting non-combat challenges, even crossing a wide river is a major challenge at level 1. You don’t have to worry about the wizard making everything trivial. The only downside of level 1 is that it is easy to die in combat, but that is what makes it exciting for some players, and if that isn’t the case for your table don’t introduce any deadly combat until the characters reach level 2.

Well I for one was glad it was nothing like Game of Thrones. For starters my children are just getting into D&D and I wanted something they would enjoy watching. Plus it just wouldn’t make sense, nothing about D&D indicates realistic gritty fantasy in the style of Game of Thrones.

I liked the movie and I thought it was exactly what the hobby needs: well executed light family entertainment that was respectful of the genre.

I was worried that there would be too much slapstick humour, but I think they nailed it.

I hope the movie becomes really popular and leads to extra sales for all TTRPG companies.

My reading of the rules is that stealth is not broken until after the first attack is made.

The advantage the diviner wizard has is that they know they are in danger, just not what that danger is. So the wizard has the opportunity to buff, retreat, hide, change weapons, etc. Nowhere does it say in the rules that the diviner wizard ability auto-negates stealth. The GM in the opening post has ruled correctly in my point of view.

There are lots of great ideas there. The battle of wits is my favourite.

You might want to add some complexity to the challenges so that there is some strategy involved in how they are tackled rather than have each challenge come down to just a skill roll.

For instance, for the strength challenge, contestants have to move 2,000 pounds of sand across a precarious bridge in the time it takes for a small candle to burn down (1 hour). They may use a large barrel to carry the sand that weighs 100 pounds when empty that can hold 500 pounds of sand when filled to the brim. Carrying more weight means fewer trips, but is slower and more fatiguing and more tricky to maintain balance (depending on how encumbered the character is). Magic could be used to help to make the character stronger, more agile and/or move quicker.

Boomerang Nebula wrote:

In Pathfinder magic item creation feels transactional, the consequence being that there is no sense of wonder, or lore, or danger, or adventure, or mystique, or anything else about magic items that makes them the slightest bit interesting.

So, if magic item creation is restricted or banned, there's more wonder in the game? Can't they still buy items? Isn't there still an entire section of the Core book that explains what spells + skills and CL go into making most items, so players know mechanically what creates them? Won't there still be a financial incentive for players to hoard a bunch of items to sell later for better gear?

These are all true. Lots of things regarding items blunt the fantasy of PF1. You can ban item creation and also say "there's no magic marts" such that PCs can't buy, sell or even trade magic items. You stand over your players' shoulders and forbid them from looking at the section of the Core book, AoN, PFSRD and other sources for rules on item creation and the details of each item. All of this would, in theory, force a sense of "wonder" about magic items.

But let's go even a step further: how do you feel about Spellcraft and Knowledge (Arcana)? The fact that Detect Magic is a cantrip? That with a high enough skill check, by RAW a PC can ID a cursed item as well as all the properties of a standard, non-artifact magic item? Does that remove a sense of wonder?

4 PCs, L1, are brutally ambushed by a cross between a python and a velociraptor in the woods. A simple DC 12 Knowledge (Arcana) check ID's the monster as a Tatzlwyrm, a kind of dragon; a higher check tells the PCs to beware it's poison breath weapon and more. Does THAT remove wonder from the game?

My point is only that there are many rules in this system that could, in theory, ruin the "fantasy" of the game. You can either restrict or eliminate all of them, playing with the Swiss cheese of what's left of PF1, not play this system at all, or you could find a way to narrate around these...

I don’t want to ban magic item creation, some players enjoy that aspect of the game, I want to amend the rules to make it more interesting for more people.

My issue is not with character knowledge. It is that magic item creation feels nothing like magic. Magic in literature is dangerous and unpredictable, which makes it interesting. Magic item creation in Pathfinder is safe and predictable, and therefore boring. Magic in Pathfinder works more like well understood technology than our common sense understanding of magic as being different to science and technology.

There is no equivalence to the Tatzylwyrm example you mentioned as there is no Knowledge (arcana) level of skill that by itself solves the issue with confronting this monster. The element of risk that makes the game interesting is always there in encounters with monsters.

Or to consider this from a different perspective. What do players invariably do with magic item creation? They do things like create a cloak of resistance to improve their saving throws. What they are really doing is risk mitigation. Or in other words making the game less risky/more boring. I would prefer that the process of magic item creation was itself risky in some way, that there are consequences when mere mortals use magic to solve their problems. I would prefer that there were hidden dangers with creating and using magic that get more extreme as the magic grows in power.

As a player I find the crafting aspect of the game one of the most boring parts. At our table there is never enough time in game to cover everyone’s crafting requirements so at the end of each session all the players sit around for half an hour arguing about what the crafting priorities should be. Our sessions are typically 3-4 hours total, so 30 minutes doing what seems like administrative work feels like a drag.

I would rather:

A) Make crafting exciting, make magic items dangerous to make, require side quests, and have interesting flaws.

Or

B) Just dispense with crafting and make magic items cheaper to buy and more available.

I haven’t seen magic item creation derail a campaign so I’m not convinced that it is overpowered.

The only time I’ve considered banning magic item creation is for story reasons, e.g. that kind of magic lore was lost and forgotten and the PCs can find that lore and restore it as part of the overarching campaign storyline.

What I would like to do is go the other way and make magic creation much cheaper and quicker, but with the catch that magic doesn’t last long. The idea being to encourage the PCs to scout, infiltrate or otherwise interact with and understand the location I’ve created before they go blundering around killing everything in sight.

the Paladin should give her a nice diamond and check her for "spirits" using a geiger counter. Then he'll be carbon dating an ancient dragon which also answers the thread title.

I assume you mean radiocarbon dating, which is used to estimate how long ago a creature died.

Although perhaps dragons are inherently radioactive at birth and it diminishes over time in a predictable way, therefore radiocarbon dating can predict how long they have been alive. That would be cool. I bet that is a piece of dragon lore that is often overlooked.

Boomerang Nebula wrote:

Mark Hoover 330 wrote:

Well, VM beat me to the punch with mites, and RK took my second fave kobolds. I would say outside the obvious Vermin, Animals and Undead, I have a lot of fun with the fey.

Wait a minute! Unless Mark Hoover and Mark Hoover 330 are different people then you beat VM by over 7 years.

Holy Shnikies! I completely missed my old avatar up there! Well there you go, kobolds and mites... :)

It’s nice to know that despite being in a Topsy Turvey world some classic things haven’t changed.

Well, VM beat me to the punch with mites, and RK took my second fave kobolds. I would say outside the obvious Vermin, Animals and Undead, I have a lot of fun with the fey.

Wait a minute! Unless Mark Hoover and Mark Hoover 330 are different people then you beat VM by over 7 years.

As a GM my preference is for the players to flee or surrender when combat doesn’t go their way rather than end in a TPK. There is plenty of role play potential with a captured PC.

From my experience the main reason players don’t surrender boils down to a meta-game calculation that they would rather play a new character with all their gear than a weakened and imprisoned version of their current character. Those players who do surrender (admittedly a rare occurrence) are generally the most engaged in their characters and do whatever it takes to give them even a slim hope for survival.

I quite like the concept for the Master Spy prestige class, but like the rogue it is weak compared to other classes.

A fairly straightforward idea is to convert the abilities of the Master Spy to Rogue Talents of the same level. For example Concealed Thoughts would be available to rogues of fourth level or higher.

I also like the way skills work for the Phantom Thief archetype, which is one of the ideas I think the opening post was going for.

I don’t agree on that.

Both Feeblemind and Bestow Curse affect “creatures”, not “corpses” (like Gentle Repose) or “dead creatures” (like Reincarnate). Both Feeblemind and Bestow Curse would cease working when a character dies so there is nothing for Reincarnate to remove.

That IS the tragic twist, isn't it?

Most of the cultists aren't even Evil, themselves... they are closer to Yuris, the breadmaker, who has befriended the PCs and goes out of his way to show kindness to the party when they pass his shop, only to be found in the sewers three sessions later, his face streaked with tears holding his own daughter to a slab, a knife in his other hand, crying over and over "you don't understand... she HAS to die... its the only way to stop it... the end is coming, don't you understand? I'm so sorry baby... it'll all be over soon..."

I cannot imagine the manipulation necessary to create the mindset of a man who is tearing himself apart inside, committing possibly the most horrifying act in his life, all for some apocalyptic belief.

I have a straightforward definition for evil people: people who make evil acts.

For me the cultists are still evil, we just happen to know what turned them to evil, and maybe there is hope for redemption, but they are definitely evil and will detect as such if they have sufficient hit dice.

Otherwise I have to work with a definition of evil that is too nuanced for my brain to handle with all the other stuff GMs have to do. I’ve tried running games that are more subtle and nuanced, but I found them to be too much like hard work.

In my experience players don’t always know what they want.

The most common feedback I get is that they want more gritty and realistic games, but do they really? Let’s take combat. Realistic warfare is mind-numbing monotonous utter boredom for countless hours punctuated by intense short lived utter terror. Does anyone really want to play a game like that? Of course not.

As a GM I generally go with cliched villains because they are easy to represent. The GM has a tough job, to describe a whole fantasy world in a way that the players can understand. Being overly subtle or deliberately misleading is more likely to create confusion than better games. I’ve tried subtle villains, what usually happens is either the players figure it out immediately, in which case you might as well have made it obvious, or they never do and they waste precious game time on red herrings until you make it really obvious.

That’s not to say you can’t mix it up a little. For example you could have a villain that is obvious to the PCs but not to everyone else (including the NPC authorities). That way the PCs aren’t chasing pointless red herrings but the treatment of the villain is a little different.

Boomerang Nebula wrote:

I would rather make rogues better at what they are supposed to excel in rather than make them more like fighters.

And how does one make up for -10 to attack rolls over the career, only 1 good saving throw, low maximum HP, a complete lack of spellcasting, and 1 fewer attack each turn?

Like the Rogue can't afford to spend their resources on doing Rogue things because every ounce of energy needs to be directed into "Not being an Expert NPC" in combat. It is entirely possible to play the Rogue and succeed at combat, you can build nearly anything to be effective with enough game knowledge.

Would +5 to attack rolls, +1 HP per level on average, an extra attack late game, and a better saving throw really be harmful to the fantasy of playing the rogue? I argue not. With those kind of buffs the Rogue could spend some talents on things that aren't a desperate attempt to keep up with everyone else.

Right now the Shifter is a better put together class than the Rogue and it makes me very grumpy.

If you close all those gaps you don’t have a rogue anymore you have a fighter/wizard hybrid. The solution is to give rogue abilities that are thematically consistent with being a rogue and that other classes don’t have. Abilities like:

Hide in plain sight
An extra move action every turn
Ten foot step (double five foot step)
A way of resisting divination spells
Skill specialisation (like what Mysterious Stranger suggested)
Hypnotism like abilities
Countermeasures for unusual senses (like life sense)
Being uninhibited by squeezing
Easier ways to make foes flat footed
Ability to be easily overlooked in combat
Ability to act in the surprise round
Sleep with one eye open
Forgettable appearance
Unique combat manoeuvres based on misdirection
Ability to fight normally while prone
Able to stand as a swift action
Parkour type abilities
A way to dodge supernatural abilities
A way to hide their alignment
An ability to contact the local criminal underworld
A way to sabotage spell resistance
A way to partially circumvent armour (and natural armour) bonuses.
Etc.

I would rather make rogues better at what they are supposed to excel in rather than make them more like fighters. So something like giving them hide in plain sight at level 1, or a rogue talent at every level instead of every second level, or the ability to use any skill untrained a limited number of times per day.

Calybos1 wrote:

Boomerang Nebula wrote:

The simplest solution is to have monsters that don’t carry much loot.

I'm puzzled... what problem are you solving with this?

If the NPCs don't carry loot, then the party doesn't miss loot by not fighting them. Presumably, this method requires treasure to be placed elsewhere or acquired through other means.

Bingo!

Gnolls are definitely a good option. You could also consider dark folk, hiding underground or in sewers, venturing out only at night. Or, quicklings hiding motionless in plain sight, waiting for the right moment to strike.

The simplest solution is to have monsters that don’t carry much loot.

It’s called cowardice/self preservation. If you can hear that the guards next door are getting slaughtered by some unknown intruder are you really going to stick around and receive the same punishment?

Or, they are ordered to guard a particular area and they know what happens when they disobey orders and the evil overlord finds out.

Or, they are sleeping or drunk on the job.

Or, they have the perfect ambush planned right where they are already stationed.

Or, they hate the guards next door. Serves them right for cheating at cards.

Or, they don’t want to blunder into a counter ambush.

Or, the evil overlord built massive sound proof doors, can’t hear much through those things.

Or, they want reinforcements to arrive first.

Or, they are just not paid enough to take unnecessary risks.

I’m not exactly sure what you have in mind, but here is an idea anyway.

In the present some allies of Rovagug are trying to create a gate from the Dark Tapestry to Golarion with the ultimate aim of releasing Rovagug from his prison. They are prevented by ancient but powerful arcane wards.

In the future the arcane wards have weakened and there are no arcane wizards powerful enough to strengthen them once more. This has allowed some evil and alien creatures to slip through dimensional cracks and wreck havoc in Golarion. This has reduced what was supposed to be a technological paradise into a rifts-like post apocalyptic wasteland.

What the PCs need to find out is which wards are failing in the future and then return to the present and attempt to strengthen them so they don’t fail completely. If they don’t then some Dark Tapestry monstrosity will come through in the far future, and being so alien, it won’t be bound by the usual rules of cause and effect so it’s presence will ripple back into the past causing Rovagug to rise in the present.

I would reconsider letting them take high tech gear back with them. Generally speaking the more advanced technology gets the more infrastructure is required to maintain it. Whatever advantage they get will be short lived. Laser rifles and powered armour are great until the power runs out.